


Atrox

by Nika_Mikaela



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Animal Transformation, Gen, SI/OC, Tags edited as the story progresses
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-06
Updated: 2019-08-26
Packaged: 2019-10-23 14:34:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 8,045
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17685317
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nika_Mikaela/pseuds/Nika_Mikaela
Summary: SI/OC is dumped into the V:LD 'verse, sort of intended as a voice of reason/shit-stirrer. One problem: She was dumped in as a cat.





	1. Befurred She Wakes

**Author's Note:**

> Got myself into Voltron, because of course I did. Still, has been fun so far.

The first thing in her mind as the early rays of sunrise woke her was that she was sleeping on dirt. This was decidedly not where she fell asleep, so she rolled to stand, and promptly fell right back over when her balance proved skewed from her memory. She scrambled back to her feet, all four of them, and stood staring at the black-furred paws where her hand should have been. Discovering that cats were capable of panic attacks had never been on her to-do list, but there she was, frozen still in shock and terror as her brain went into overdrive.

 _“How did I get here, where is here, what’s happened to me, am I a cat, why am I a cat, I should be a human. No, no, can’t do this, not right now, gotta breathe. Okay, in, two, three, four, hold, two, three, four, out, two, three, four. In, two, three, four, hold, two, three, four, out, two, three, four.”_ Slowly her body regulated back to normal, the panic ebbing back down to something manageable rather than the immobilizing terror of before. She sat back on her haunches, tail unconsciously curling around over the tops of her front feet, and considered her situation.

 _“Okay, let’s take stock. My name is… My name is….,”_ she forced herself to breathe calmly again, if she passed out she became easy prey for any local predators, but it was still fairly damn difficult. _“I’m in the desert, which is going to suck so bad once the sun rises higher, and that means I’m outside of home ground as well as my natural body. I can’t remember my name, or the names of most of my family and friends, so calling for help is going to be tricky, assuming whatever caused this shift would allow it. I still remember Jay’s email and Netflix password, I was watching cartoons last night on my profile, but unless I’m suddenly a cat in the middle of_ Voltron: Legendary Defender _….”_ The wailing _miaow_ as she realized how badly she’d just jinxed herself was decidedly loud in the steadily warming air.

 

Something like an hour later she was hiding from the sun in the shadow of a cactus as it climbed higher in the sky. She could see what she thought was Keith’s shack/cabin/thing in the distance, but she also happened to be the size of a fucking sweet potato if her guesstimates were at all accurate and it was a long way off for such little legs. Still, once she’d cooled off enough to keep moving she started walking steadily toward the building again, grumbling quietly as she went.

There was the red hoverbike? thing parked outside the shack, which lent credence to the Voltron theory and suggested that Keith should be in the building. She hoped he had water he’d share. Cream would also be nice, because she was starving and could use some rich dairy fat, but was unlikely. She could maybe hunt up some of the local rodents and insects, see if she could just let instincts flow there, but she was going to need some water and to cool down again first, which meant she needed to get in the house.

She tried approximating a knock on the door first, but her paw-pads were basically soundless on the door and the scritching of her claws evidently not loud enough. Next was meowing at a normal volume, useless as well, sadly. Lastly she resorted to caterwauling, which would hopefully be loud enough without annoying him too much.

[Hello? Hello-oh? Is anybody gonna let me in? I’m just a little kitty. Hello-oh?] Keith yanked open the door with a glare, casting a baleful eye around before finally looking down to see her. She mewed cutely at him in response.

“How the hell did you get out here?” he muttered, scooping her up with one hand and shutting the door again with his other.

[Not a clue, sorry. Can I get some water now?] He was looking her over, including a quick flip onto her back, but she didn’t have any signs of ownership on her and god help the powers that be if she’d been fixed when they dumped her in this ‘verse, she would be having _words_ with them.

[Yes, I’m a girl; no, I don’t have a collar. Water please?]

“I’m gonna have to drop you at the shelter next supply run. Great.”

[Um, no, no thank you. I can just stay with you and come along to space once Shiro gets back, the shelter’s probably overcrowded already, they almost always seem to be. Also, can I get some water already?]

“Well you’re definitely chatty.”

[I’d be less so if you would just get me some freaking water.]

“Well, here, I’ve got some water for you at least.”

[Finally.] She sprung off his hand as he carefully lowered the shallow bowl to the floor, drinking steadily.

 

When she felt half-full of water she turned her attention back to Keith, who was working away at his conspiracy board. With a running start she bounded up to perch on his shoulder, looking over the board herself.

“...Okay then.” She licked under the curve of his jaw, nearly getting knocked off by his automatic swipe.

“Don’t do that,” he ordered firmly in response. If she were still a human she would have shrugged. Made no difference to her. Instead she just started purring as Keith got back to work.

 

She got bored after a while, Keith was absorbed in his research and she hadn’t done well with being unoccupied as a human, much less a cat who thus couldn’t knit, write or doodle. She launched herself off of his shoulder and started exploring.

 

Somehow she managed to find, track, catch and kill a mouse. Mentally it was fun, and then kinda gross because she remembered that mice carried diseases and that did get her freaking out a bit, but when she didn’t think too hard about it, it was pretty tasty according to the new feline corner of her brain, and filling since the mouse happened to be on the larger end of the spectrum. The parts of the carcass she couldn’t eat she dropped in the wastebasket, since she didn’t want to interrupt Keith just to bury the remains outside. He’d noticed and was watching her of course, because she’d had to jump up on the table in order to reach the wastebasket, but appeared to shrug it off in favor of his project. She was going to go have a nap while he worked.

 

One of the many problems with being a cat the size of a sweet potato, aside from the whole cat thing, was a bladder the size of a strawberry. She woke up with that uncomfortable realization, mostly because she could hear Keith stretching. He was standing though, so with less embarrassment than she expected, which she was attributing to the fact that she was currently a cat, she made her need to go outside known. There was no way she could attempt to use a toilet at her current size. Did the house even have utilities of any type? It wasn’t something she’d paid attention to during the show. Ah, hell working out how she’s going to survive off-planet was going to suck too. Unless Keith stuck her in a travel crate or something before he left though, she was absolutely going.

Business done, she padded back toward the waiting man before movement made her pause. There was a lizard in her line of sight.

“That thing is as big as you are,” Keith informed her dryly as she hunkered down and started prowling slowly forward. That was rather the point, it was a _challenge_. The lizard had seen her and was moving away, apparently at her size she wasn’t much of a threat because it wasn’t scrambling for cover, just ambling slowly. If she could just hit the right angle to pounce…

Keith was suitably impressed when she strutted back to him, lizard hanging from her mouth by a broken neck.

“Guess I don’t need to find you any food just yet, huh?” She purred as he scritched behind her ears and up under her jaw. She was still absolutely going to beg shamelessly if he had meat for dinner, even with her recent hunting prowess.

 

Keith didn’t have to rush out for the escape pod that night, but judging by what she’d understood of his notes it was probably in the near future, next day or so. She spent the night purring by his head until they both fell asleep. Where did he even get the necessary accoutrements to set off his distraction anyway? Did he have explosives just lying around or did the Garrison leave things entirely too easy to reach and repurpose? Wasn’t important, she was a cat, she didn’t have hands.

The crisis triggered in her brain by that thought was not fun to deal with. She had no idea how quickly her mental state was being affected by her change in form and ‘verse, or how long she’d been operating as a humanly intelligent cat instead of a human in the body of a cat. The idea that her mind was changing at such a rate and without her notice was terrifying. Keith’s hand drowsily stroked along her back before curling up under her jaw again, thoroughly distracting her. She was still freaked, but the affection helped. She’d worry about it, and the pilot episode’s happenings, tomorrow.


	2. Rise of Voltron [Part 1]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The cat encounters the rest of the Paladins.

Breakfast for Keith was a protein shake. She disapproved greatly. Breakfast for herself was the other half of her lizard, Keith had stuck it in the fridge for her when she made kitten eyes at him the day before. She considered offering him some of it, but the only reason she was mostly fine with eating it raw was the current status of her brain and body. And he was already back at his conspiracy board, too late.

Partly because she was bored, and mostly because she was a cat, she curled up to have a nap once she’d finished what she found edible and disposed of the rest. One of the few good things she’d discovered so far about her transformation was the fact that she was actually getting rest that felt like enough. She was still a cat weighing five pounds at most, and her brain was fucking with her because of it, but she actually felt like she was getting enough sleep, it was  _ weird _ . 

Keith had a surprisingly comfortable lap, for a wiry young man who likely carried more muscle than fat on his form. He clearly wasn’t used very to cats, not petting her very often as he sat, but he was a genius at working out the best spots to gently scratch when he remembered what the weight on his legs was. He also was able to lift her up and deposit her somewhere with just one hand when he stood again, but she had mostly accepted that yesterday. 

The next time Keith lifted her out of his way she hopped down to the floor and started perusing. She’d come to the realization while dozing that Keith and the others should have had a travel pack with at least some rations in it, on top of Pidge’s backpack of equipment. There was a duffle bag on the floor, she dragged it with her into the kitchenette. The cupboards weren’t too hard to open, just took some springing to reach a few, and then the food she was thinking of was mostly light. Jerky, granola bars, looked like protein bars, some apparent actual MREs, instant ramen, which wasn’t the best survival food but was lightweight and in the cupboard, dried fruit, instant vitamin C drink mix,  _ one _ can of tuna….

“What the hell cat?” Keith demanded as she tried her best to carefully organize the collection of food into the bag.

[Not that you can understand me, but I thought it might be a good idea for the humans to have at least a little human food available to supplement the nasty food goo.]

“How do you know how to pack food?”

[I used to be a person. Didn’t I tell you?] He continued to understand none of it, of course.

“Okay. Maybe it’s just a really well-trained pet?”

[Oh, I dearly wish you could understand me boya. I have so many things I could say to that.] Keith scooped her up, depositing her on his shoulder so he could finish packing the bag properly.

“Looks like something’s happening tonight, guess it couldn’t hurt to be prepared.”

[Good thinking. Always listen to the cat,] she purred approvingly, clinging carefully to his shirt as he worked.

  
  


She still wasn’t sure how Keith had managed the diversion, she’d stayed firmly put on the bike rather than risk getting left out in the middle of the desert again, but it was just as effective as she remembered from the show, allowing Keith to swoop in without any exterior personnel interfering. There were still the techs in the quarantine unit, of course, but Keith was probably stronger than the average fit young man if he could deck the lot of them in one or two strikes, because that had seemed unrealistic when she first saw it.

Keith didn’t actually know she was perched on the bike, she was tiny, pitch black, and taking advantage of it. She didn’t want to miss this though, it was going to be fun. Plus, she could get a head start on purring at Shiro. 

_ “Probably won’t do a thing, I think that’s purported for bone and muscle healing more than nervous tissue, but it might make him feel better all the same, so it’s worth a try. Will certainly make me feel useful if it does help any.” _

 

She didn’t pay much attention to the last of the conversation on the ridge, which was a shame because she remembered it being amusing, but she tuned back in at Pidge’s bewildered demand for information regarding Keith’s identity. It was sometimes a wonder that Pidge was able to present as a boy so well, but then she remembered that Naruto was voiced by a lady throughout the series in both the original Anime and the English dub and it all made sense. The three teens barreled past into the quarantine, interrupting her musings and reminding her that they were on a deadline.

Lance immediately started trying to bicker at Keith, which was sad but amusing, and would be more so when they weren’t trying to liberate an escaped POW from Garrison custody. She yowled from her spot on the bike as the sound of engines returned to her range of hearing.

[Hurry up you nutbars, they’re not going to be gone much longer!]

“What the fuck cat?” Keith muttered as they hauled ass to the bike. She just purred smugly at him as everyone else piled on. The Garrison staff were approaching and it was time to go, he could be annoyed at her later, if he remembered.

“Will this thing hold all of us?”

“No.” Keith’s teeth clenched around the word. She almost felt bad about how the others proceeded to ignore him and hop on, but it was still vaguely funny even as it was fairly rude.

The moment Keith lifted off she latched on to Shiro’s filthy shirt with her teeth, which was exactly as disgusting as it sounded, but felt important for his continued placement on the bike. Forepaws curled as far around his upper arm as possible, and her hind claws sunk into the seat beneath her. More bickering was happening overhead, she couldn’t expect much else from teenagers, they tended to antagonize each other even when friendly, and some fancy driving that took advantage of the terrain had her swaying as she hung on.

The drop was not ideal even as it was necessary; she clung fiercely to Shiro and the bike as best she could until Keith re-engaged the engine.

 

[Well that sucked,] she declared as she hopped off the bike, [Let’s never do that again, okay? Okay.] No one paid her more than a brief notice, of course. Keith and Lance were hauling Shiro into the shack, Hunk and Pidge trailing behind. When Shiro was deposited on the bed she hopped up next to his head and started purring furiously, cuddled in close on the pillow.

“Good cat,” Keith whispered, turning to figure out what to do with the rest of the uninvited guests in his home. She licked the finger stroking across her head briefly before returning her attention to Shiro. Keith and the others would be fine until morning.

 

“So…” Shiro began, heartfelt moment interrupted by her rubbing against his ankles, “where did the cat come from?” She sprung up into the crook of his elbow and further from there to his shoulder.

[From another universe where this one is the setting for a Netflix series. I was a person in that one, with a name and everything. Fucked if I can remember though..]

“I have no idea, she was just wailing outside my door day before yesterday.”

“And then you fed her?”

“And then I gave her water. She’s mostly fed herself.”

[There was a mouse, which was fun, freaked me out, and then was reasonably tasty once I got over the freakout. The lizard was even better, it was too big to eat in one sitting so Keith stuck the remaining half in the fridge for me.]

“Friendly little thing.”

“She’s weird is what she is.”

[Ugh,  _ rude _ .]

“You tried to pack a duffle full of food by yourself, cat, you know you’re weird.”

[Still rude.]

“You do remember you’re arguing with a cat?” Keith huffed. She could see Shiro suppressing a brief smile before he sobered again.

“Seriously though, how did you know to save me when I crashed?”

“You should come see this.”

 

She didn’t pay much attention to the exposition of Keith’s conspiracy board and Hunk’s invasive tendencies, hunting down another mouse. No one else seemed to be hungry (except Hunk) after all the excitement but she happened to be starving.

 

“Here, carry that,” Keith ordered, slinging the duffle full of food from the previous morning at Lance.

“What, why?” Lance sputtered indignantly, although she noted that he didn’t drop the bag.

“Because if you’re going to invite yourself along on this you might as well make yourself useful and keep the cat from trying to drag it the whole way.” She  _ mrrp _ -ed in agreement when Lance turned an incredulous stare at her, nodding cheerfully.

“She’s like the size of my foot.” This was true, all but Pidge could probably cover her entire tiny body with one foot if they were so inclined, and Pidge would probably get there once she’d hit full growth.

“I never said she was a smart cat.” That, on the other hand, was rude. She growled disgruntledly at Keith and stalked away with her tail in the air. Shiro didn’t mock her for trying to make sure her newly adopted humans ate, and he was due for another dose of Shoulder Cat Therapy.

“See, now look what you did, you’ve gone and offended her.”

“...She’s a cat.”

“Well that’s just typical. Cats have feelings too, you know. I’m pretty sure there’s been a couple studies on it.”

“...” Evidently Keith was done with Lance. Lance was not going to take that well… yep, there he went. That was going to be  _ fun _ to deal with for the next several years. Time to sit with Shiro for a bit.

 

“Hi cat,” Shiro greeted as she used the sleeve over his prosthetic as a ladder to reach his shoulder. She  _ mrrp _ -ed at him happily, scent-marking along the underside of his jaw.

“Okay, that’s enough,” he slid his original hand between her head and his, scritching behind her ears. Her fluff was most likely too ticklish for the soft skin of his neck, now that she thought about it. Probably why Keith nearly swatted her off his shoulder when she licked him that one time. 

Purring vigorously, she settled in for a long trip to the cave. At least she didn’t have to walk this time, unless Shiro needed her off. 

 

The glowing thing was incredibly cool in-person, if also deeply weird. She chalked it up to metaphysical stuff caused by the presence of the Blue Lion and moved on, because there was a nice big lizard by the entrance that would make an excellent in-flight meal. Shiro cemented himself as her favorite by waiting for her to come prancing back dragging the corpse and picking them both up before catching up with the others.

“You couldn’t have eaten before we left?” Keith muttered, glancing at the lizard. It was bigger than the last one.

[I did. This is for later. I’m going to be hungry by the time we get to the Castle, I’m sure, and it wasn’t like you keep any cat food I could have brought along for on Arus.] Keith just sighed. She wasn’t entirely sure why he’d asked to begin with, because he well knew by now that they couldn’t verbally communicate in a mutually intelligible fashion.

 

Falling without warning was less than fun. Sure, she knew it was coming in theory, but that didn’t mean much when she didn’t have a way to properly brace herself cupped against Shiro’s chest with her lizard, which she was not going to let go of thank you very much, she had no other definite source of food for the future. 

 

The Blue Lion was one gorgeous lady. Huge, but classy. She didn’t see the vision the other five did, she wasn’t a Paladin after all, but she did get an approving rumble in the back of her head for the thought, probably because she was a feline too. That would be interesting to see if it translated to the other four later.

She’d already known Lance was a cheeky shit, but he was certainly proving it once again. It was no wonder that the water-aligned lion liked him. Made her wonder at his hidden depths, but considering the oceans of earth were an easy home for eldritch horror both naturally and in the human minds of her timeline, they were probably better off not knowing unless he was well and truly provoked.

Originally, she’d been the kind of person to enjoy flying. Takeoff was one of her favorite parts for the sensation of pulling away from the ground, rising steadily into the air. Today? Not so much. She was thrown from Shiro’s shoulder into Lance’s lap thanks to his fancy flying. She dug her claws through his pants and into the flesh of his thighs in retaliation and stabilization, lizard still hanging from her teeth.

“You’re the worst. Pilot. Ever.” Keith declared.

[Seconded,] she growled, [tele-empathic bond or not you don’t know what you’re doing yet you nutbar.]

The lion’s autopilot kicked in soon after, thankfully. They left the atmosphere and got clear of the Galra ship approaching, which was exciting so long as one didn’t think of if the Galra hadn’t come about after the lion for any reason, and not long after that they were through the wormhole portal. Much democracy happening in the cockpit, she paid it minimal attention since inviting herself along was essentially casting her vote with the level of information she had versus theirs. She bit Lance in the stomach when he passed gas with her in his lap though, that was both rude and obnoxious.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know, I know, bit of a weird place to stop, but the cat has decided she wants to try and eat my plot thread instead of letting me knit it up into a coherent thing so I'm currently trying to reclaim the ball before it gets shredded.


	3. Rise of Voltron [Part 2]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Alteans, more Lions, and Voltron, oh my.

The castle was definitely pretty, but she wasn’t surprised it felt ostentatious in person. It was a castle, that was almost the point. Technically of course the point of most castles was siege defence, but honestly the Castle of Lions read more palatial than that. It was a cartoon spaceship meant to transport massive lion mechs though, so whatever. Speaking of, why was Hunk so sure that a lion-shaped personal ship, no matter how autonomous the AI, was going to eat them? Not only was it a ship, with cockpit access through the mouth that he’d already been in and out of, lions in general didn't eat people without extenuating circumstances as far as she could remember.

 

She bounced down from Shiro’s shoulder to prance up the stairs with her lizard. The stairs were admittedly a little too tall for it and Shiro scooped her up after the third time she threw Lunchmeat up onto the next step and scrambled after.

[I was having fun you know. It was kinda like rock climbing. Much easier though, which is good because I’m not the best at rock climbing. I start expecting my own body to give out and try to kill me.]

“Does anyone else get the feeling that the cat is actually saying things when she talks at us?” Lance wondered.

[You’re forgiven for the excessively fancy flying,] she decided. The rest of the group ignored him; they’d reached massive, wide-open doors.

 

Evidently the universal translate system didn’t work on feline brains, even human-to-feline ones. She dropped Lunchmeat in surprised annoyance.

“ _Well shit._ ” There was an amused rumble in the back of her head, not Blue, she was still pretty good at recognizing and differentiating sounds. Black then.

“ _Help a kitten out?_ ” More amusement, consent, concentration. Ho boy that felt _weird_ . She shook her head rapidly despite how utterly useless it was at dispelling the sensation of Black weaving knowledge and understanding into her brain.   _\--Whatthefuckwasthat!--_

She swiped extended claws at the rapidly approaching hand, scrambling the hell away from whoever just tried to grab her and up Shiro’s clothes onto his shoulder. He automatically reached up to steady and pet her, the repetitive motion helping to regulate her breathing.

“That’s a cat. They do that when you freak them out.” Keith deadpanned.

“And this?” Coran was holding the lizard corpse by the tail between thumb and forefinger, which presumably meant he was the one to try and touch her. She was a little miffed that she missed, but if she remembered right Alteans were canonically faster and stronger than humans, so he was more likely to dodge than not.

“That’s a lizard. She killed it and brought it with her to eat later.”

“...It’s two-point-five times her size.” Yes, she was an excellent hunter for only having two days to get used to being a tiny, tiny cat, thanks for noticing.

“If we could focus on the _lions_ , please.” She was...probably going to have a bit of an issue with Allura for a while, sadly. Tone of voice had been weirdly integral to her interpersonal interactions as a human and she could hear so much more with regards to tone now.

She glared at Coran, gently kneading Shiro’s shoulder with her front paws, until he put the lizard down and stepped away. He was smarter than he looked.

 

She dug into her lizard with some (expected) effort, Coran watching incredulously. She’d decided against riding along on either of the lion retrieval missions, even if the giant gondolier sloth would have been cool to see in person. Seeing as she’d gotten hungry not five minutes after the two expeditions set off, it was a good decision. She would have left the lizard with Keith because he could be trusted with her food and she didn’t remember if the Paladin suits had pockets, and then she would have been hungry and mildly grumpy even while exploring a whole other planet with a sloth gondolier chauffeuring them to the Green Lion Temple (it looked like a stereotypical temple, she was calling it a temple) because Shiro undoubtedly wouldn’t have wanted her out of his sight on a strange planet, no matter how peaceful. One of the many cons to her involuntary sojourn.

“You touch that and she’ll try to maul you,” Keith warned drily. Ah, Coran was attempting to examine her lunch again. That explained why she’d suddenly started growling into it. He could take a look when she was good and done and not before, thank you.

Coran sputtered at the comment, indicating their respective sizes pointedly.

“I never said she’d actually succeed, just that she’d try.” Just for that, Keith could be in charge of saving the rest of the lizard for later. She climbed his clothes to hang the half-eaten carcass in front of his face.

 

“That’s disgusting.” Coran had to agree, that couldn’t be sanitary. Well, at least it wasn’t currently dripping blood.

“Mrrow.”

“You say that like I keep ziplocs in my pockets.” He had no idea that humans were capable of communicating intelligibly with their domestic felines. Fascinating. He wondered what a “zip-lock” was and what it had to do with the reptile body.

“Mrr?” Keith made a discontented noise.

“ _Fine_.” He took the dead reptile from the ...cat, that was their term, rolling his eyes when she rubbed her face under his chin before leaping off him to sit primly near his feet. That looked almost like Danevari Plrr’tek pack marking, except without the transference of pigment. Coran was once again incredibly intrigued by the small, almost lion-shaped ball of fluff.

“You guys got a fridge or something around here that we can save this in.”

“Save...dear boy, if it wasn’t before it most certainly is now well and truly dead.” The cat’s ears pricked up and he saw her tail waving back and forth slowly for a moment before she seemed to deflate in disappointment.

“...Keep for her to eat later, Coran, not revive. Don’t go giving her ideas.”

“Mau,” the cat complained, seemingly glaring.

“You’re bad enough without the possibility of zombie lizards. What happens if they get too smart for you to kill and get loose?” The cat gave an impression of studied unconcern far too big for something her size, strutting away. Coran directed Keith to the smaller private kitchen where he could safely preserve the lizard, returning to Allura to render as much assistance as possible in locating the Red Lion once the young man was on his way. He made a mental note to enquire about dietary requirements at a later date, as the beastie was clearly a carnivore or similar and that would have to be taken into account if the Paladins were convinced to stay, as Coran remembered what could happen when domesticated species were left on unfamiliar planets. The poor Y’lava on Schei-N’to had been nearly outcompeted by domesticated Tamarrn from Dai before the situation was brought back under control.

“ _Assuming,_ ” Coran corrected himself, watching the cat prance after Keith, “ _the Paladins could have managed to leave her behind._ ”

 

She didn’t have much to do, being a feline tagalong, so as soon as she knew where to find her lizard she went down to Black’s hangar to keep him company. She wasn’t sure why she got a masculine impression from Black, but if the rest of the lions gave her feminine impressions like Blue did it would make sense from what little she knew of lion pride composition. Didn’t Pidge call hers a lady in a later episode? Not important. She made herself comfortable in the hangar.

Black’s idea of an appropriate use of downtime was to further improve her understanding of Altean into true fluency, at least in the most common dialect that Allura and Coran preferred, made much easier by the fact it was all done via gentle mental immersion, and move on to what she guessed was probably Zarkon’s native dialect of Galran. She approved immensely. She’d been fascinated by languages as a human, not that she’d been very good at staying in practice speaking the few she’d gotten slightly conversational in, and Black was helping her pick it up much faster than she would have even dealing with immersion like she was going to be.

Idly, she wondered if the Paladins were fluent in languages outside of English and if the Lions would be able to teach her without it being invasive to the humans involved. She thought she’d read somewhere about Shiro, Lance, and maybe Hunk and Keith, but that could have just as easily been fanon as canon with how little she paid attention to the division between sometimes. There was that one fabulously hilarious fic where Shiro hadn’t actually spoken English from when he’d crashed to when a Galra base jammed the translators under the assumption that the Paladins needed them to communicate and function as a unit.

Black projected amusement at the imagery. He offered the impression that most planets were sadly the sci-fi stereotypical one language per planet. She was in a cartoon, so she supposed it was to be expected. Black was apparently delighted by the idea of a planet with over two-hundred forms of spoken language, and the realization that it existed in their present universe. She did remember to tell him that humans may have picked a few to work as semi-universal for the planet, and lost even more languages thanks to the decline of native speakers than the ones she’d vaguely known of in her timeline.

 

Pretty ladies all, three out of the expected four so far. Yellow and Green felt bemused, but also amused so she’d take it as a win of a first impression. Hunk was getting Shoulder Cat Time for a minute though, that had to have been a miserable situation to fall into. Lance would get his turn after Galra ship. Unfortunately she was pretty sure she only had time for one Paladin before Sendak showed up with Red, so Hunk it was.

 

She prowled the bridge while her humans went on rescue/retrieval. It was annoying but it wasn’t like she would have been of any use infiltrating the ship, even if the Alteans could miraculously produce an exo-suit or whatever in her size. She was too small to fight, not fast enough to play bait or forward scout if she could reliably communicate, not to mention that her Galran was pretty spotty as yet.

...Why did her brain like Sendak’s voice, even as she dearly wanted to bite the person producing it? Sometimes her auditory things were so _stupid_. She had pre-insertion, and she still liked Shiro’s too, so at least it wasn’t a cat-brain liking cat-like Galra voices thing. She needed a nap. After her people were back safe and available to sleep on. She needed her humans to be done soon.

 

Four for four and wow were they all lovely. Red was not impressed by the weird little fluffy thing that was somehow peripherally connected to the inter-Lion bond (and wasn’t that something she could go into a nice deep nibnose spiral about later), but that was okay, she wasn’t expecting Red to like her any time soon anyhow. She wasn’t sure Red actually liked Keith yet.

She wasn’t sure about Voltron as a whole, aesthetically, but she did admit that the mechanisms to combine the five Lions into one robot were engineering marvels. Did the Paladin’s cockpits stay in the Lion’s heads though? That seemed nauseating, particularly for Red and Green. Blue and Yellow wouldn’t be much fun either. Maybe the cockpit were recessed further into the Lions and their viewscreens projected feeds from Voltron’s “eyes”?

The Lions were laughing at her again. Just because she could and would spiral into a little bundle of curiosity and questions over interesting topics… If they were flesh she would bite them. Since they weren’t she just pointedly ignored them, cuddling up with the exhausted but exhilarated Paladins. She felt incredibly lucky that no one seemed to have any allergies or sensitivity to cats, because the cuddles were definitely as much for her as for them.

When they finally dispersed for bed she clambered up onto Shiro’s shoulder. She liked all the Paladins, they were fun and all could definitely use more affectionate contact, but Shiro took priority at the moment when it came to her probably minimal therapeutic benefits.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tried a Coran POV just to see what would happen, don't think I'll do that again, I'm not sure how well I got him. Next up, Some Assembly Required and one pissed-off kitten. 
> 
> Fic mentioned is Nobody Speaks English In Space by JUBE514: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11625834 because it's a delight and I can't believe I didn't find it earlier.


	4. Some Assembly Required

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cat has an interesting day. So do the mice.

It was decided, she was going to piss in all of Allura’s shoes. She had been having a perfectly nice morning napping between Shiro’s shoulders while he did push-ups before the alarm went off and Allura started screaming over the intercom. Sure, he was already up and in his armor, which wasn’t the most comfortable, but she was keeping him company and it wasn’t like she had anything to do yet. Except eat the lizard, but that could wait until she was more than just vaguely hungry.

Emergency or not Shiro was still a gentleman, even to a cat, so he let her situate herself as he stood before hustling down the halls to the bridge. The armor’s claw-holds weren’t as good as his regular clothes, but she was stable and steady as they reached their destination.

Lance sauntering like that one Starbucks meme was doing good things for her mood. Yes, it wasn’t appropriate behavior for a member of an elite fighting unit, but they weren’t even close to a cohesive team yet, even if circumstances required them to be combat ready in the very near future. Also Allura was just pissing her off, but she’d known she was a petty, vindictive bitch since she was a twelve-year-old human so that wasn’t actually surprising.

Apparently they were just going to fly around in the Lions and try to form Voltron that way first. Honestly, she’d forgotten, she wasn’t fond of this episode.

“I’ll take the uh, cat,” Coran offered, hands already reaching.

[Touch me and bleed,] she hissed, swiping bared claws at his fingers.

“Or not.”

“It’s fine Coran,” Shiro promised, soothing down bristling fur with one hand.

“Cats are pretty independent by nature,” Pidge offered. She purred at her, hopping from Paladin to Paladin until she’d buffed her head against every chin and was closer to the ground. Allura and Coran were pointedly snubbed, but she doubted anyone was expecting her to warm up to them soon anyway, not with how she’d been responding so far.

 

She wasn’t chasing the mice because she was hungry. She had a nice long lunch of lizard and Coran had apparently made inquiries as to what they could feed her in the long run, as well as the Paladins once they ran out of human food to supplement the goo, so it may or may not be gross but she probably wouldn’t starve. No, she was absolutely chasing the mice because it upset Allura to see her careening after their fat little selves. She wasn’t hurting them, just gently chewing on their soft parts when they got stupid and thus caught before letting them escape for another round. At worst there was drool and light bruising under their fur.

[You are so fucking stupid. I caught you on the turn. I saw you take those turns with my own eyes five minutes ago you dumb rodent,] she growled, gnawing Platt’s fat thigh. Platt patted at her face cheerfully with a forepaw, not even flinching when she pressed down harder,  _ this close _ to breaking skin, before releasing again. She growled, giving them all a thirty second head start. 

Oh, her people were back. She wandered off toward the humans blithely. The mice would figure it out or they wouldn’t. The exercise was good for them and it was only seventy-five percent as fun to chase them when Allura wasn’t watching and bitching as when she was.

 

The Lions weren’t terribly impressed with her wilfully antagonizing Allura and trying to injure Coran. The latter they’d at least agreed was his own fault for trying to touch her without permission, she was never very good with externally initiated physical contact and now her startle reflex had stronger violence appended to it. Still, while it wasn’t that they  _ disagreed _ with the former behavior, exactly, because Allura’s abrasive and superior attitude was rubbing them the wrong way too, even if it was fairly probably accidental and/or stress-related, they didn’t particularly approve of being petty and rude in response. The mice themselves gave absolutely no fucks, but she’d figured that out when even the little red-eyed shit, Plachu, started responding to her ambushing and chases like they were playing a game, albeit one he was forced to participate in. 

She settled into a steady lope after the mice, allowing them a moderate head start, as the Paladins started the shield training. Dodging the Gladiator while the Paladins were training their teamwork in combat was pretty easy too, before she finally herded the squeaky things back out of the training room.

“That is not normal cat behavior,” Lance declared.

“Sure Lance.”

“No, no, I’m serious. Cat’s are nocturnal ambush predators, yeah? She’s been running the mice most of the day like a diurnal pursuit predator.”

“Maybe she’s just got better stamina than the mice. They have been frozen for about ten thousand years.”

“Hunk, buddy, you know I hate to tell you when you’re wrong-”

“You do?”

“But you’re definitely wrong here.”

“Why do you even know this?” Keith demanded.

“Humans are your basic pursuit predator and we tried semi-successfully to breed the first dogs into more pursuit predators to hunt with. Why don’t you?” 

Okay, Lance was currently second favorite after Shiro, at least until he did something that was decidedly stupid instead of amusing. She did have to admit that it was kinda weird, if only to herself, as she left the Paladins out of earshot to water the mice. They were definitely flagging, Platt and Chulatt especially, but she was only moderately tired. She’d been pacing herself, of course, and had spent at least a good twenty minutes draped over Shiro’s shoulder when the Paladins reentered the castle after the defenses shut down, but she’d been more active the entire day than the last two put together, when you calculated the number of naps she’d taken. Naps were good, she should find time for one.

“Paladins, focus or you’ll never form Voltron.” And there were Allura’s dulcet tones (read: strident scolds) right on cue. She was projecting too much, or on the intercom, one of the two. So much for that nap. Maybe she could hide out with Black for a bit? He’d let her sleep, right? 

Apparently not only was he going to let her nap, he was going to share some delightful memories from when Zarkon was still a sane person. ...And he had ulterior motives since that was a tiny Allura being precious. Joke was on him, she could easily feed her dislike on Allura’s current behavior while liking the small one she used to be. 

 

She still couldn’t say she was really that fond of Coran, even if he hadn’t been involved with/encouraging a situation that felt vaguely racist, speciesist? Whatever, his voice was annoying even if he weren’t being almost as obnoxious as his princess, but he  _ had _ made her a protein slurry. It tasted like strawberries for some reason and looked like congealing blood, which the morbid corner of her brain found hilarious as all hell. With her coloration she looked like a vampire cat as she drank the liquid and chewed on the chalky crunchy bits that reminded her of the chewable vitamin tablets from before gummies became more popular. Or antacids, but that was from hearsay rather than personal experience like with the vitamin C tabs. Admittedly, if her luck had been any more interesting and landed her as an albino rather than solid black it would have been even creepier, but if she were a true albino she could have wound up blind, and her main focus wasn’t to be creepy anyway. Naturally red eyes would be so cool though.

Everyone involved was very lucky that she did not get caught in the crossfire during the food fight or there would have been bites all around. It smelled disgusting, she didn’t want to have to groom it out of her fur and find out if it tasted as bad as it smelled. Still, she was mildly impressed that they’d managed to form Voltron from that. 

The mice were looking hopeful when she turned toward them as the team got more practice moving in a single form. She made a disgusted noise.

[Fine, go, but I’m picking back up in the morning. A second’s difference can be vital in survival and that’s what the name of the game is for us peripheral beasties.] Chuchule, the only female (which was… yeah. Not exactly a terrible situation when one is being realistic and concerned about being overrun with mice but in the only moderately realistic sci fi cartoon? ...Yeah) made a face, miming Allura in a tiff.

[Well, yes, also that, but she’s currently acting more like a danger to my humans than a help so it’s not  _ just _ because it’s hilarious when she’s impotently angry.] All four of them seemed confused.

[Well, they’d have to catch me to get rid of me.] The mice had to concede that point, she’d proven to be very fast after all. Wait a sec, when had the mice learned how to understand her?

Black was laughing at her again. Asshole, no wonder he’d let her nap in the cockpit. That better not mean Allura could understand her bitching now. 

According to the lovely Yellow, Allura could not. Good, she had no intention of letting the Alteans realise exactly how sapient she was unless unavoidable.

[Allura does not find out I can talk to you, understood?] The mice collectively rolled their eyes, but nodded. They were already much more tolerable than the other biologically Altean organisms of her aquaintance. 

[Good. Actually, that reminds me, I believe we may need to have a  _ discussion  _ about secrets tomorrow.] She had to grin when they shared wary looks at her tone. Even as a fuzzball she still had it.

 

She followed Shiro and Pidge onto the roof of the Castle, wondering idly about it’s construction. The building’s entire architecture was weird, honestly, but maybe the artigrav kept the rooms oriented as when on-planet while the ship’s towers acted like the nose of a rocket for flight?

_ “Enough speculating and pay attention to your humans. Wait a minute, was that one word a slip borrowed from Newspeak concepts? Bad brain, no biscuit.” _ She shook her head, which translated into a full-body shake that made her look even fluffier, and approached them. Luckily, she seemed to have just caught the tail end of their conversation, rather than interrupt them before Shiro promised Katie that they would find Matt and Dr. Holt. Good, she could just play comfort creature and hop into Pidge’s lap.

“Oh, hi cat,” Pidge greeted, petting once before her hand was caught gently between grasping paws.

“Mrrp,” she declared agreeably, rasping at the captured appendage with her bristled tongue. Pidge and Shiro shared a glance overhead and chuckled at the affectionate behavior.

“We should probably name her,” Shiro remarked as Pidge moved her hand back and forth, dragging the amused cat along for the ride.

[Oh! Yeah, a name would be good. Yes please.]

“Huh… Maybe Lance was right, that did sound like agreement.” 

[Welp, Shiro’s definitely still my favorite.]

“How are we going to name her? Should we put it to a vote?”

[Absolutely not!] she hissed, bristling. Humans were welcome to suggest and argue names but the minute that a vote became the method of choice the dumbest option ultimately won. She remembered the whole Boaty McBoatface stupidity.

“Okay then, that’s a no on the vote,” Shiro laughed. It wasn’t funny, but whatever, he was probably too young to have seen it if it had happened in this ‘verse.

“Apparently.” They shared a glance. She started grooming herself.

“What about Nala?” She froze, paw halfway to her tongue, to stare wide-eyed at Shiro. Two seconds later she was purring madly and buffing her face against every available surface of his body.

[Good human, best human, favorite for  _ ever _ ,] she declared, to their amusement.

“Well, Nala it is I guess.” She purred even harder. She had a name again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeah, we're very late. Nala wandered off with my inspiration for this one, and then flung it into the pile of boxes in the back of my mind like real-life Mykkie-girl did her handmade catnip ball. Still, back, hopefully for a while.

**Author's Note:**

> Well, this should be interesting, shouldn't it?


End file.
